The Age of Invention

The Age of Invention: A Chronicle of Mechanical Conquest is by Holland Thompson. The prefatory note says the volume is not intended to be a complete record of inventive genius and mechanical progress in the United States. The note says the book seeks to outline the personalities of some of the outstanding American inventors and indicate the significance of their achievements.

The text says Franklin carried on experiments with the Leyden jar, made an electrical battery, killed a fowl and roasted it upon a spit turned by electricity. The text says Franklin's letters to Collinson tell of his first experiments and speculations as to the nature of electricity, and that he began to develop the theory of the identity of lightning and electricity. The text says the word telegraph denoted at first a system of semaphores, or tall poles with movable arms, and that there was such a telegraph line between Dover and London at the time of Waterloo.